High Court Agrees To Hear Rights Case Of Christian Student Group
The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal by a Christian student organization that says a San Fransisco public law school violated its rights by denying it recognition because it holds on to Christian principles.
The justices today said they will decide next year to whether University of California’s Hastings College of Law is infringing the group’s First Amendment rights by enforcing a campus-wide open-membership requirement whchi requires all of its officers and voting members to subscribe to its basic Christian beliefs.
Five years ago, the Christian Legal Society chapter at Hastings was told by the school that they could not continue as a recognized student group at the law school if its officers refused to pledge to continue to follow their religious convictions.
Attorneys with the Christian Legal Society and the Alliance Defense Fund Center for Academic Freedom are representing the Hastings student chapter of CLS.
Kim Colby, Senior Counsel with the CLS Center for Law & Religious Freedom says the school is singling out the Christian students and demands that they abandon their identity and beliefs if they want to be a recognized group on the campus.
“Public universities shouldn’t single out Christian student groups for discrimination,” says Colby. “All student groups have the right to associate with people of like-mind and interest.” “We trust the Supreme Court will not allow Hastings to continue to deprive CLS of this right by forcing the group to abandon its identity as a Christian student organization.”
ADF Senior Legal Counsel Gregory S. Baylor with the ADF Center for Academic Freedom says Christian students have a fundamental right to gather as Christians for a common purpose and around shared beliefs.
“It’s completely unreasonable–and unconstitutional,” said Baylor, “for a public university to disrupt the purposes of private student groups by forcing them to accept as members and officers those who oppose the very ideas they advocate.”
The group says it was denied meeting space on the campus as well as denied placing announcements in the law school newsletter and on bulletin boards as a means of communicating with students.
Ironically, Hastings is asking the Supreme Court to reject the group’s appeal, saying their campus organization policies “encourages tolerance, cooperation and learning among students of different backgrounds and viewpoints.”
The college admits that the Christian Legal Society is the only group that has been denied recognition.
Petition for Writ of Certiorari: Christian Legal Society v. Martinez
Related posts:
- High Court Rules Against Christian Student Group
- Supreme Court Justices Note Dangers In Christian Case
- Appellate Court Sets Filing Deadline For Student Christian Group
- Court Agrees With Rights Of Student Expression
- Ninth Circuit rules against Christian Legal Society
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